Intravenous or IV medicines have greatly enhanced our quality of life. They are very effective, fast acting, easy to administer, and easy to control. Such medicines are typically introduced to the patient via tubing which is connected to an IV needle located in the patient's arm. The needle or tube is held in place with tape, bandages, specialty adhesive covers and the like which form a mostly permanent installation.
A major disadvantage of intravenous setups like those described above is that many patients, who may be in a confused state of mind, are prone to rip out their IV lines. This is dangerous as it leads to medicine being introduced into the room and can cause injury to the patient. Other similar problem is that many patients accidentally remove their IV lines by moving too far from the source of the line.
Various attempts have been made to provide breakaway valves for various fluid lines, including U.S. Pat. No. 3,921,656; U.S. Pat. No. 4,340,049; U.S. Pat. No. 4,722,725; U.S. Pat. No. 4,872,471; U.S. Pat. No. 5,364,371; and U.S. Pat. No. 5,492,147. However, none of these designs are similar to the present invention.
While these devices fulfill their respective, particular objectives, each of these references suffer from one (1) or more of the aforementioned disadvantages. Many such devices are not suitable for use with intravenous tubes. Many such devices do not adequately seal both sides of the valve as is desirable for intravenous tubes. Many such devices do not provide sufficient flow through the valve when operable. Accordingly, there exists a need for a breakaway valve that can be utilized with intravenous tubes without the disadvantages as described above. The development of the present invention substantially departs from the conventional solutions and in doing so fulfills this need.